Looking for a Good Book?

There is a lot going on in our Colt Learning Commons.  Students are regularly in and out checking out books to read.  Students read 30 minutes each week in their ELA classes as well as one day a week in Advisory.  Reading is a great way to ignite curiosity, learn vocabulary and become global citizens! We have some new resources in our CLC that might interest you.  Read about some new books and then join us in the CLC to check one out or sit down and read for a while!

Family and Consumer Sciences: Not the Home Economics of Yesterday! By Katie Adams

Guest post by Katherine Adams, CMS Teacher

The pathway that lead me to teaching Career and Technical Education was an interesting one.  When I finally declared my major I had every intent of becoming a Psychologist.  It wasn’t until I had the amazing opportunity to travel and work in Japan for a summer that I realized my intense desire to help prepare our youth for life outside of school walls.  Upon my arrival back to the states I met with my college advisor and began to look to see how I could make the transition from a psych major to an education major a reality.  

At first, when Family and Consumer Science was brought up, I dismissed it.  Thinking what many people today still think, “Oh, that’s the class you take to learn how to cook and sew…” I am here to tell you, you (and I) are so wrong in holding onto that belief.  Too often we hold onto the ideas of the past and allow it to shape our futures.  The journey that has taken place in Home Economics as it has transitioned into Family and Consumer Sciences has been an immense one.  As an educator, I feel it is my mission to help prepare students for life outside of the classroom confines.  As a Family and Consumer Science teacher, I have the opportunity to teach my students about life, how to budget their finances, how to apply for a job… more importantly how to keep a job.  I show them the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and the effects it can have on their life.  I encourage them to make choices now that will make a difference in who they plan to become in the future.  

Picture Left: Students got a “Reality Check” on the true cost of living on your own.  

This year in particular, my focus is on preparing my students so that when they get to high school - they are one step ahead.  I want them to have prior knowledge of what they should expect - so that when the time comes to apply for their first job, or apply for a scholarship they have resources filed away to use as needed.  

We just wrapped up our college and career unit.  Students had the opportunity to research the college of their choice and were asked to evaluate data such as: entry requirements, acceptance rates, tuition/fees and scholarship/financial aid.  I asked all students to reflect on what really stood out to them throughout their research.  It was interesting to hear many of them make comments about how they never realized just how many students apply and don’t get accepted to the school of their choice.  I posed the questions, “What can you start doing NOW to make sure you stand out from the rest?”  The resounding answer was, “Get involved!”  

Picture Left: As a part of their college research, students create a college pennant and an oral presentation over their findings.

To encourage my students to get involved, I created and shared with them an Experience Log.  This log is essentially a spreadsheet that allows them to track their involvement in a multitude of ways - so that when they are ready to apply for college and/or scholarships, they have a vast pool of resources to pull from.  It encourages them to get involved, whether it be clubs outside of school or volunteering in the community.  It not only serves as a visual reminder of all the areas in their life where they can be participating, but it also encourages them to set goals for themselves and track their growth over their high school career.  

Through this log, students can track their current GPA, community service hours, participation in clubs/activities/sports, ACT/SAT scores, AP Classes taken, Awards Received and much more.  They are encouraged to update it often through their high school career and use it as a tool when apply for scholarships and college in the future.  I explain to them the importance of keeping up with it and how valuable it will be when senior year rolls around and they need to begin to apply for scholarships and college.  I hope to plant the seed now that they should not wait until their senior year to think back on all they have done.

Career and Technical Education plays such a pivotal role in the lives of the students who take our classes.  We are teaching them skills that will hopefully following them from their middle school days into high school and beyond.  By instilling these ideas into their minds at a young age we are allowing them to become accustomed to them so that they will be one step ahead of their competition as they enter the real world.   

English Language Arts Learning by Pat Huster

Where has the time gone? We are already into the eighth week of school, and our students have been quite busy in their English/Language Arts classes. Students have been reading, writing, presenting, and learning vocabulary. In addition to our core language arts classes, 6th & 7th grade students have chosen an ELA Elective.

ELA Curriculum

Our language arts curriculum uses SpringBoard:English Textual Power, published by The College Board, as its textbook. Each grade level focuses on a different theme that runs throughout the lessons. Our 6th grade students study the theme of change, while 7th grade students learn about choices, and 8th grade students follow the idea of challenges. Now in its 4th year at CMS, SpringBoard is the vehicle that makes rigorous standards attainable for all of our students through vertically aligned and carefully scaffolded strategies-based instruction.

Through SpringBoard, students:

• are exposed to higher-order thinking skills
• practice close analysis with pre-AP and AP reading strategies
• confronted with increasingly challenging texts
• challenged by complex writing tasks

With their exposure to these AP strategies, prompts, texts, and writing tasks, our students will be well equipped for their journey through the 21st century.

In the Classroom

This week 8th grade classes have been busy exploring how the protagonists in Fahrenheit 451 and The Giver follow the Hero’s Journey archetype and using direct text evidence to support Short Answer Responses. In addition to their reading, students are participating in Socratic Seminars about Questioning Society’s Rules and Laws. Next week 8th graders will dive into graphic novels as their final preparation piece before they create visualizations of the Hero’s Journey in graphic novel format for their Embedded Assessment.

 8th grade Socratic Seminar

  8th grade Socratic Seminar

7th grade students are working on revision skills, a vital part of writing. Students are revisiting a piece of writing they completed earlier, revising the piece, and then reflecting on academic and personal growth. 7th grade students will be taking the Writing STAAR this spring which will focus on a written essay in addition to revision and editing skills.

6th grade students have been busy discussing the concept of change. Personal narratives are wrapped up and students are now focusing their efforts on expository writing. Thesis statements, topic sentences and transitions have all been big topics in class recently. This next week students will participate in  Writing Workshop where they will develop the following skills:

• presenting effective introductions and concluding paragraphs
• guide and inform the reader’s understanding of key issues in body paragraphs
• include specific facts, evidence, details and examples in body paragraphs
• include appropriate organizational structure
• use a variety of sentence structures and transitions to link paragraphs

As you can see, our core English/Language Arts classes have been working hard by reading, writing, listening, and speaking. They are developing the skills that will grow into skilled problem solvers, effective communicators, collaborative workers, self-regulated learners, and global citizens.